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slung over his left shoulder, so full it was tilting him in that direction.
    Nick’s heart rate climbed as he watched the kid standing there, feeling a shadow of what Rainey’s parents must be feeling right now, but even the shadow of that dread was cold and cutting.
    Moochie kept the image moving, frame by frame, as Rainey came to a stop about a foot from the plate glass, shading his eyes to stare in at the pirate treasure, even, at one time, pressing his snub nose up against the glass, flattening it out in a comical way, his breath misting up the glass. People were moving past him in the image. No one was paying him any unusual attention.
    “Freeze it there,” Nick said.
    He leaned down to look at the kid’s face. The expression on it was utterly absorbed. He was staring at something in the display, and whatever he was looking at had completely fascinated him.
    He was held there, as if by a spell, frozen and transfixed.
    By what?
    “Did he ever come into the shop?”
    Moochie shook his head.
    “I don’t let the Regiopolis kids come in. They’re all thieves. Little Ali Babas. Just like the street kids in Beirut.”
    “Do you know what he was looking at, in the window? Whatever it is, it’s sure got his attention.”
    “He’s looking at the mirror. I finally figured out it was that mirror,” said Moochie, staring at the boy in the frozen frame. “From the way he’s standing, it’s right in front of him. He’s looking right at it. It’s the one in the gilt frame. It’s very old, prewar at least. I mean the Civil War. It came out of Temple Hill, the old Cotton mansion up in The Chase. Delia Cotton gave it to her housemaid, a lady named AliceBayer, she lives in The Glades, and Alice came in one day and asked me for fifty dollars on it. I gave her two hundred. It’s worth a thousand. I still have the ticket. Rainey liked to see himself in it, I think. He always stood there, looking into the mirror, anyway, just like that. Then he’d sort of shake himself out of it and off he’d go. The glass is rippled from age, so I guess it’s sort of a fun-house thing for the kid.”
    Nick made a gesture and Moochie started inching the frames forward again, Nick looking for something, anything he could use. At time marker 1513:54 Rainey started to move his head backwards, his mouth opening. At 1513:55 he was starting to step back onto his left heel, and his mouth was opening wider.
    At 1513:56 he wasn’t in the picture at all.
    The camera was aimed at an empty patch of sidewalk.
    Rainey was gone.
    “Is it the camera?” Nick asked.
    Moochie was just gaping at the screen.
    Nick asked him again.
    “No. It never does that. It’s brand-new. I got it put in by Securicom last year. Cost me three thousand dollars.”
    “Back it up.”
    Moochie did, one frame at a time.
    Same thing.
    First frame, Rainey’s not there.
    One frame back, there he is.
    He’s stepping onto his heel, with his mouth wide open.
    Another frame back, he’s still there, and now he’s close to the window, but beginning to …
    To what?
    Recoil?
    From what?
    Something he saw in a mirror?
    Or someone behind him, reflected in the mirror. What the hell was going on here?
    “What’s the recording stored on?”
    “The hard drive,” said Moochie, still staring at the screen.
    “Is it removable?”
    Moochie looked at him.
    “Yes. But—”
    “I’m going to need it. No. Wait. I’m going to need the whole system. Do you have a spare?”
    Moochie was far from thrilled by this development.
    “I still have the old camera, hooked up to a VCR.”
    “Run it again, one more time. This time go right through the sequence.”
    Moochie pressed ADVANCE .
    They stood and watched as Rainey Teague stick-walked jerkily into the frame, leaned close to the glass, stayed there, his expression growing more fixed as the seconds passed, Rainey drawing closer and closer to the glass until his nose was pressed up against it and his breath was fogging the window.
    Then